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*Clooney/Quin’s Dannan Fox. Photograph: Gerard O’Neill
A “HUMDINGER” has been predicted for the meeting of Clooney/Quin and Cratloe this weekend where the winner will secure a place in the TUS Clare SHC quarter-finals.
Both clubs have defeated Wolfe Tones and lost to Newmarket-on-Fergus meaning that whoever prevails in Sixmilebridge on Saturday evening advances to the last eight.
Clooney/Quin have received a boost with Peter Duggan cleared to play on Saturday. The Clare forward picked up a straight red card against Newmarket while a hamstring injury kept Podge Collins out of Cratloe’s second round loss to Kildysart in the Clare SFC.
Recording a win on a margin of ten points has given Cratloe a lift, manager John O’Gorman admitted. “We’re much happier now to have finally got off the mark. We said before we went out that if we won the toss, we’d take the elements as we needed a good start after the last day and I thought the reaction of the lads was brilliant. The players knew that themselves that with such a wind that we needed to get a good start and build up a seven or eight point lead by the break”.
Work-rate noticeably increased in the space of the first and second round, the former Cratloe defender believed. “We’ve worked on our discipline and pressure and intensity and most importantly work-rate. We didn’t have that the last day against Newmarket and it cost us so we knew that we had to im-prove on that and I think the lads did today”.
O’Gorman is expecting an exciting affair in O’Garney Park this weekend. “It’s winner-takes-all now between ourselves and Clooney/Quin now. It will be a humdinger so we just have to get ourselves focused and right for that now”.
Clooney/Quin have had to reflect since their three point defeat to Newmarket-on-Fergus, manager Tommy Corbett said. “It’s disappointing. I felt that we didn’t really get into the game for the first 25 minutes. They [Newmarket] were really up for it more than we were which was surprising but maybe that comes down to experience as we seemed a little shellshocked at times.
“This is a reality check for us now. We have a lot of young players and most of them are either in their first or second year at adult hurling so no matter how much you try and prepare them for what’s coming down the tracks, the practical reality of it is that until now, they didn’t really know what it was like to be in a really intense senior championship match,” he stated.
Corbett continued, “So while the Wolfe Tones result was huge for those young lads, I presume that they also thought that this is what senior hurling is all about but at the end of the day, you have to win your individual battle first before you win the match”.
A win is all the Clare Cup finalists are focused in order to secure their place in the quarter-finals for a successive season. “We’re still in with a shout of a quarter-final and in the group we’re in that’s all you could ask for. I mean all four teams were in the quarter-finals last year so it was also ways going to be difficult. And while we would have loved to put it to bed after two games, we still have a 50-50 shot against Cratloe to make it to the next stage”.
Lively duo Ryan Taylor (ACL) and Callum Hassett (ankle) remain sidelined for Clooney/Quin. “We’re down two marquee players in Ryan Taylor and Callum Hassett but in saying that we’ll have Shane McNamara and Ulick O’Sullivan back in the fold. It’s a squad game so while we’d love to have a full panel available to us, that’s not going to be the case so we just have to get on with it”.
